The Value of Discretion

[Excerpt] In Shakespeare’s Henry IV, the lazy and lecherous Sir John Falstaff is attacked during battle, falls to the ground, and feigns his death. Falstaff attempts to justify his act of cowardice by explaining: “The better part of valor is discretion, in the which better part I have sav’d my life.” By exercising his “discretion” to fake his death, Falstaff rationalizes that he is free to live to fight another day. There is little to be lauded in Falstaff’s distorted worldview. Yet, employers may find something illuminating in Falstaff’s value of “discretion.” Employers can forego paying minimum wages and overtime compensation if their employees qualify under one of many exemptions provided for under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) or its state counterparts. The most commonly invoked of these exemptions — the administrative exemption — requires that employees exercise “discretion and independent judgment” in the performance of their primary job duties

High resolution solar X-ray studies

Two high resolution solar X-ray payloads and their launches on Aerobee rockets with pointing system are described. The payloads included 5 to 25A X-ray spectrometers, multiaperture X-ray cameras, and command box attitude control inflight by means of a television image radioed to ground. Spatial resolution ranged from five arc minutes to ten arc seconds and spectral resolution ranged from 500 to 3000. Several laboratory tasks were completed in order to achieve the desired resolution. These included (1) development of techniques to align grid collimators, (2) studies of the spectrometric properties of crystals, (3) measurements of the absorption coefficients of various materials used in X-ray spectrometers, (4) evaluation of the performance of multiaperture cameras, and (5) development of facilities

Direct measurement of the HCl dimer tunneling rate and Cl isotope dependence by far-infrared laser sideband spectroscopy of planar supersonic jets

The large amplitude tunneling motion of the HCl dimer has been directly studied with a tunable far‐infrared laser sideband/two-dimensional free jet expansion spectrometer at hyperfine resolution. Rotationless tunneling rates for the three common chlorine isotopic forms are v(35–35)=463 979.2(1) MHz, v(35–37)=463 357.7(1) MHz, and v(37–37)=462 733.7(3) MHz. Both the rotational constants and hyperfine parameters indicate that the vibrationally averaged structure shows little variation within a given tunneling state, with both HCl bond angles giving an average projection on the a-axis of 47° in all states with resolved hyperfine patterns

Stratospheric feedback from continued increases in tropospheric methane

Tropospheric concentrations of methane have increased steadily over the past ten years at an average rate of 16.5 ppbv per year, to a value in January 1988 of 1.69 ppmv. Measurements of CH sub 4 concentrations in air bubbles trapped in ice cores have shown concentrations of about 0.7 ppmv 200 years ago, with little further change for thousands of years before that. Interpolation earlier into this century suggests a concentration of about 1.1 to 1.2 ppmv in the 1940's. The only important pathway believed to be important for transfer of air from the troposphere to the stratosphere in through the tropical tropopause which is cold enough to reduce the mixing ratio of H sub 2 O in that air to about 3 ppmv. The only other major pathway for the delivery of H to the stratosphere is through the simultaneous injection of gaseous CH sub 4 in the same rising air. The formation of clouds in the stratosphere is dependent upon very low temperatures, and generally upon the amount of water vapor available. The possibility of a positive feedback exists, especially in well-oxidized methane air, that clouds are easier to form than earlier. This could mean enhancement of PSCs in both Antarctic and Arctic locations. Additional H sub 2 O in the stratosphere can also add to some of the greenhouse calculations

The identification of gamma ray induced EAS

Some of the penetrating particles in gamma-induced EAS from Cygnus X-3 observed by a single layer of flash-bulbs under 880 g cm/2 concrete, may be punched through photons rather than muons. An analysis of the shielded flash-tube response detected from EAS is presented. The penetration of the electro-magnetic component through 20 cm of Pb is observed at core distances approx. 10 m

Experimental determination of dipole moments for molecular ions: Improved measurements for ArH^+

An improved value for the dipole moment of ArH^+ has been obtained from new measurements of the rotational g factors of ArH^+ and ArD^+ made with tunable far‐IR laser spectroscopy. Systematic errors present in earlier measurements have been eliminated. The new result (μ=3.0±0.6 D) is slightly higher than the ab initio value of Rosmus (2.2 D) at the 2σ limits of precision